Anonymous goes to war with ISIS and shoots itself in the foot

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Groups associated with Anonymous launch a new “op” quite frequently, but the recent #OpParis has attracted more attention, because it’s a reaction to the recent terror attacks in Paris that claimed more than 130 lives. The goal of the op is apparently to expose Twitter accounts and websites that are run by members of ISIS, which has claimed responsibility for the attacks. However, reports are now claiming that the vast majority of Twitter accounts targeted by members of Anonymous aren’t affiliated with ISIS at all. Oops.

Like many of Anon’s past ops, #OpParis and #OpISIS are aimed mainly at reporting accounts run by the group being targeted. Any personal details of the account owners uncovered are also made available online. The semi-official OpParis Twitter account has claimed that more than 20,000 Twitter accounts belonging to members of ISIS and its supporters have been suspended. It’s reasonable to think that Anonymous members have reported that many accounts, but it’s looking increasingly unlikely that many of them have anything to do with ISIS. In many cases, the accounts may actually be run by anti-ISIS individuals, journalists, and academics.

Anonymous is distributing an automated reporting script that can be used by members to report accounts to Twitter en masse. The list of supposed ISIS accounts is available on Pastebin, and indeed, many of the accounts are now suspended. However, when you’re reporting thousands of Twitter accounts, it’s hard to do your due diligence to make sure they actually match your criteria.

One self-proclaimed hacktivist known as th3j35t3r has publicly called #OpParis out for accusing innocent people. The #OpParis Twitter account even agreed with him… before deleting that Tweet (see above). He also claims that if anything, Anonymous is being used by ISIS affiliates to garner more attention for the terror group. A Twitter account can be opened in a few seconds, so even if ISIS accounts are caught up in the sweep, nothing of value is really lost.

Twitter has apparently lost faith in the mass reportings from Anonymous members, calling them “wildly inaccurate.” Twitter actually has fluent Arabic speakers who can review reported accounts to determine if they are actually promoting terrorism. The FBI is also not having any more of Anonymous’ crap. Members of the op claimed in an interview that the group had uncovered information related to a planned terror attack on a WWE wrestling event in Atlanta tonight. The FBI has said this information is not credible.

If this is what Anonymous’ “total war” against the Islamic State looks like, they might want to go back to the drawing board.

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